It has often been said that solar cells are like artificial versions of the photosynthetic apparatuses found in plants, such as leaves, since both harvest sunlight. But nature's leaves can do something that most solar cells ...

Nature has perfected the art of using the Sun to fuel growth. A team of international researchers looked into what is needed to recreate the process artificially. The results could have various uses, from an alternative to ...

Virginia Commonwealth University researchers studying a key molecular player called Hsp70 that is responsible for protein homeostasis have uncovered how it binds together with another molecule responsible for intracellular ...

Purple bacteria are among Earth's oldest organisms, and among its most efficient in turning sunlight into usable chemical energy. Now, a key to their light-harvesting prowess has been explained through a detailed structural ...

(Phys.org) —For some solar cells, the future may be fluorescent. Scientists at Yale have improved the ability of a promising type of solar cell to absorb light and convert it into electrical power by adding a fluorescent ...

Wireless charging will soon be available for more and more mobile phones. VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland is working with the industry's leading technological companies and standardisation bodies to expand the scope ...

Energy transformation

In physics, the term [energy] describes the amount of work which may potentially be done by forces within a system. Changes in energy in systems can only be accomplished by adding or subtracting energy from them, as energy is a quantity which is conserved. (Loosely, changes in the energy of systems also coincide with changes in the system's mass).

Energy in a system may be transformed so that it resides in a different state. Energy in many states may be used to do many varieties of physical work. Energy may be used in natural processes or machines, or else to provide some service to society (such as heat, light, or motion). For example, an internal combustion engine converts the potential chemical energy in gasoline and oxygen into heat, which is then transformed into the propulsive energy (kinetic energy that moves a vehicle. A solar cell converts solar radiation into electrical energy that can then be used to light a bulb or power a computer.

The generic name for a device which converts energy from one form to another is transducer.